Hit Man, co-written and directed by Richard Linklater, is based on a 2001 Texas Monthly feature by Skip Hollandsworth on the sort of juicy subject magazine writers rarely cross paths with in a professional lifetime: a mild-mannered, average Joe-looking psychology lecturer with a nondescript name, Gary Johnson, who’s moonlit for years as a killer for hire. Put another way: Johnson poses as hitmen with backing from the Harris County district attorney’s office. He’ll meet up with the person requesting his services — a vengefully disgruntled employee, a jilted spouse — and, with the help of some wire and a decked-out van outside listening in, coax out just enough damning evidence for an arrest.
Glen Powell, who also co-wrote the film, plays Johnson. Because of his several bids over the years for a movie stardom that continues to elude him, Powell is often joked about as an actor the industry, as much as it would like to, can’t make happen, to the point that Powell even knows it. Along with last year’s entertaining albeit slight romantic comedy Anyone But You, Hit Man feels poised to be the film with enough power to change that. He has a cocky-grinned swagger that recalls an in-his-prime Brad Pitt. In moments where he’s being flirtatious, you can sympathize with a scene partner who can’t help but blush. It’s canny casting: Johnson was so good at pulling accidental confessions out of people not just because he chameleonically played “characters” to better seduce his opponent of the day; he was also charismatic enough to make people feel like they could tell this stranger what they knew they couldn’t tell anybody else.
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Peterson Reviews 